The rooms are quiet, the hallway still,
A heavy silence on the sill.
The shoes that cluttered up the floor
Are gone beyond the front-end door.
The nest is empty, wide, and bare,
But memories linger everywhere.
My heart is caught in bittersweet,
Where pride and longing softly meet.
I watch you step into the light,
And spread your wings for steady flight.
You’ve reached the goals you set to find,
With brilliant strength and gentle mind.
I hold my breath, so proud to see
The incredible soul you grew to be.
Yet in the quiet of the night,
I miss the laugh that made things bright.
A mother’s love is bound and tied
To every step you take outside,
A fierce, unchanging, endless bond,
That stretches out and far beyond.
Go chase the stars, go claim your day,
I’ll love you from a house away.
And though the emptiness is deep,
It’s promises of you I keep.
The world and all its splendor where life begins
Human Beings of all and those who I call friends
America our diverse country and all that she defends
Nights and days of the week especially the weekend
Knowing those who I can count on until the bitter end
Family first is a favorite motto that I often recommend
Underneath the covers and snuggled up to her rear end
Love above all to say the least not fake or pretend
Flowers and trees mixed with the sky and how they blend
Old muscle cars with big motors and a shiny chrome front end
Reading poetry from The Soup often over, and over again
Written for poetry contest "I Am Thankful For.." 11/24/2024
Hosted by: Tania Kichen Form: Rhyme Acrostic
My front end needs alignment and my rear end sags a lot
My vinyl seats get cold in fall; in summer they're too hot
Beneath the seats; old french fries, pennies, napkins, Laura Scudders
My fuel intake is kind of rough, sometimes it coughs and sputters
My lights are growing dimmer and my gas tank's sprung a leak
My steering wheel's bent out of shape; my windshield wipers squeek
My engine's losing power and my tires have lost their tread
My spark plugs all have lost their fire, my radio's gone dead.
My axle's looking fractured, and my frame is rusting through
My paint job's getting faded and my brakes are fading too
My oil is getting grungy, my speedometer flat-lined
My A/C blows warm air and my transmission tends to grind
This car of which I speak is ME (in case you didn't know)
It's running rough, but still it gets me where I need to go
These classic wheels still get around - they just move r e a l l y s l o w!
written 31 Oct 2021
so annoying
when a wreck happens
on the interstate
I always watch the semis
When they vie for the fast lane
I do too
Using their highway prowess
Except this time two were wrong
They led me into a lane that did not move
Six cars were off,
All apparently hitting each other.
A Chevy comes roaring up from behind
The driver must be good.
The front end is all bashed it
As he passes me I see his back end is all bashed in too
I give him as much room as I can
Admiring the way he slid into a tiny spot made for half a car
Boy dancer shudders at his reciting girlfriend,
He wants to leave but she wants the front end;
All his life he's dreamed to be a dancin' machine,
Two-foot spinning, twirling, whirling fiend ;
Girlfriend speaks she's a tremendous orator;
She stands before the audience a skilled presenter;
Boy dancer shudders at his reciting girlfriend;
Stops abruptly standstills to listen;
For you see the speech she shares,
Glorified stories of her dancin' bear;
7/21/19
written words by James Edward Lee Sr. 2019©
The dancer shudders at the exciting girlfriend;
He wants to leave but she wants the front end;
As I look up into the skies I'm praying;
As I take up into the pitches I'm staying;
Whether tap or ballroom fancy prancy dancing;
Or showing off those moves foot loose chancing;
6/23/19
written words by James Edward Lee Sr.©2019
THE MOST DANGEROUS ROADS
i've got the head of a rattle snake
on the front end of my hood
i've got a chilled clorox drink
in my steel-knuckled hand
and we're rolling down I-10
across the stretch between Phoenix
to the Cali border and 85 deaths
a single year makes me quiver
shifting the stick to overdrive
Smiling as I rumble over America's
most dangerous road
kissing the guardrails
flirting with the slops
to side ditches so steep
but not as fun as I-15
from LA to Las Vegas I say
it's all the way or no
it's all the way or no
it's all the way or no
it's me spreading my ashes
across the country I love
it's me treading the coals
with a swizzle stick in my nose
yeah here we go
:: 03.05.2016 ::
From the cedar closet she reached
for a bundle. Holding her breath,
she pushed her head through, pulling down to her torso.
Scattering moths as she walked through the hallway
Breathing only on the front end of her stride.
Just having fun with words and free poetry - kind of like a free verse front/end acrostic-
W inds howling through prairie grasses Warning
I mpending snowfalls and hail will be Icing
N ightly with cold gripping hands, Nipping
T reetops, stripping them and Thieving
E ventually erasing all color, whilst Etching
R ootless imprints 'til next season’s Rendezvousing
It was a dark, snowy night,
My blurry eyesight,
I'm just trying to get from point a to B
But I can barely see,
I can hardly walk, talk, stand,
My slurred speech,
I know I shouldn't be driving,
But nothing will happen to me...
Until all of a sudden my car swerves,
It ignites my nerves,
I jerk the wheel to avoid going off the road,
Little did I know,
A car was coming the other way,
I didn't have the time, to move my car,
I crash,
The airbag explodes,
Glass shatters, I stagger,
Out of the car, blood dripping,
From who knows where...
I hope they're okay, their car's crushed,
The front end mangled,
The drivers tangled,
In between the seats, I try to reach,
For them, but I collapse,
The pain rushes through my punctured
Lung,
I'm done...
I lie down, try to breathe,
But it hurts, sharp pains
Pierce my veins..
I can't move, hurt and cold, I can't speak,
I wish I would've listened when they preached,
I was dumb, believed in invincibility..
Now I'm dying, my future is bleak,
I close my eyes, try to regain peace,
Slowly I'm numbing, it's a welcomed ease,
I drift away, into my mind,
Never to wake, I've left it all behind..
He saw a hazy little light
A dream or a reality in sight?
Little light at the tunnel’s end
Stay or move on? …
A solitary trip set up a story
The late-night trail lay empty
Little light at the tunnel’s end
Stay or move on? ...
In the silence, he used his cane
Hauled his unfit leg down the lane
Little light at the tunnel’s end
Start and move on? …
Left behind him, a dusky tunnel
The light of hope at the front end
Pulls him toward the tunnel’s end
Don’t die in a tunnel…
In recent daydreams, I bemused
trekking the wild African plain -
herds of hippoes and elephants
petrifying prey with their might.
Envisioning the behemoth
I recall a story about
behemoth’s strong powerful tail.
So my reverie is confused.
An elephant’s tail I see as
a bottle brush, skinny, floppy.
I had heard, read, or seen somewhere
“the behemoth’s tail sways like a
cedar” which immediately
brought to mind the elephant’s trunk.
This trance has the power to amuse
I ponder the thought of a writer
who mistook the front end for the
rear end of an elephant and
in typical dream fashion had
created a new fantasy -
the legendary behemoth.
At this point my head went on cruise
drifting to comic books of old,
where behemoth is a monster
set in the tales of Atlantis.
I recall a trip with puppets
electric eels, whirlwinds, quicksand
from the brilliant minds at Marvel.
For writers impelled by a muse
to pen our imaginations,
dreams make perfect sense while dreaming.
Sweats, rapid heart beats are the proof
when we awake in frantic haste
to get it all down on paper
before our mind reverts to truth.
Funny talk... "diddly squat"
Means basically nothing to me!
Where do these words come from?
Do they grow these things on trees?
What a joke... "a pig in a poke"
Fooled unsuspecting buyers!
Instead of a piggy inside the bag
Twas a kitty cat for the fryer!
But of course... "hay's for horses"
Here's another reason to spend?
Some stuffing for your Jockeys
To give you a fuller front end!
Just my luck... "I'm a dead duck"
She caught me with this lady!
Not to worry, it all turned out
Twas Mom so nothing shady!
Whadya think... "Take forty winks"
Causes trouble with wifey poo!
Of course if you wink at a filly
And the filly winks back at you!
It's really absurd... these silly words
They upset our daily routine!
They've been known to turn sunny days
To the ugliest days ever seen!
© Jack Ellison 2013
Previously-Owned Car for Sale
By Elton Camp
(This write assumes knowledge of the
TV program “The Dukes of Hazzard.”)
This car just simply runs like a dream
That it can fly, it does almost seem
It’s owners so smoothly get in and out
The doors never loudly slammed about
The car windows are always kept down
It’s the most aired-out car that is around
Driving country roads you’ll never hate
It almost makes them seem as if straight
Even if it should somehow get a dent or two
Just an hour later, the car looks like new
The suspension’s redone, front end realigned
So it should never fail and leave you in a bind
It was mainly driven by two fine young men
Often used to transport their elderly uncle in
How much they loved the car you can see
Since they named it General Robert E. Lee
So if it is a noteworthy automobile you seek
This is one that can be described as “unique”
Come on around and buy this vehicle for a song
You can be certain that it won’t last very long
(this happened a week ago Friday to a fellow teacher and friend
of mine named Phyllis. I thought it was quite a story and she
got on the tv news in Utah)
Late
night as
her husband
drove them through an
intersection, there
came barreling at them
a drunk with his truck lights off!
He ripped off their car’s front end at
the point where their feet touched the floorboard.
In one sliced second, Phyllis missed sure death.
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